Long reads on the history, food, wine and landscape of our extraordinary region
Gascony is one of the least-visited corners of France, and one of the most rewarding. We've been exploring and writing about it since we arrived. These are our longer essays — on the spirits, the history, the food, and the culture of the place we call home.
People ask us when the best time to visit is, and we never quite know how to answer — the Gers is never doing nothing. A month-by-month walk through the flowering year, from the wild poppies and bee orchids of May, through tilleul and sunflowers, to sloes, the vendange, and the wild cyclamen of winter.
Read article →Every spring we get the same email: "we're looking at the Dordogne, but we've just found you — how do you compare?" Our honest answer, expanded. What the Dordogne does brilliantly, what forty years of being famous has done to it, and what the Gers offers that, quietly, it can't.
Read article →Every autumn, as the Armagnac stills are lit across the Gers, our guests ask the same question: what is Armagnac, and how is it different from Cognac? Our full answer — the distillation process, the three subregions, the vintage culture, and how to taste it properly.
Read article →Our honest five-day answer to "where should we go?" — markets and Roman ruins, botanical gardens and medieval cloisters, Madiran wine estates, a Cistercian abbey with a Picasso upstairs, and the most pleasant riverside lunch in the Gers.
Read article →Are you in Gascony? The Gers? Armagnac country? The answer is all of them — each name a different layer of the same extraordinary history, laid down by Romans, Visigoths, Basque tribes, English kings and French revolutionaries.
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Our insider guide to Larressingle, Fourcès, La Romieu, Lavardens, Eauze and more — the hidden gems of Gascony within easy reach of Séailles.
Read the Guide →
